RAMALLAH—Dr. Barghouti, Secretary General of the Palestinian National Initiative, said that the Israeli government’s announcement to build 1,400 new settlement homes in Jerusalem and the West Bank is a continuation of the colonial settlement war against the Palestinian people, their land and the destruction of the idea of the two-state solution.

Dr. Barghouti said that Israel’s announcement coincides with the release of 26 Palestinian prisoners, the third installment of prisoners released as part of the ongoing peace negotiations. This fact, said Barghouti, confirms that Israel’s settler government manipulates and maneuvers in order to create facts on the ground.

The consequences surrounding Israel’s release of the publication tenders are serious, added Dr. Barghouti. They show that Israeli is extorting and exploiting the negotiation process, using the talks as a cover for settlement expansion.

Dr. Barghouti emphasized that betting on negotiations with Israel’s settler government is akin to betting on a mirage.

Barghouti called on the international community to impose a boycott and sanctions upon Israel in order to deter such actions, stressing that the appropriate response to Israel’s actions lies in the escalation of popular resistance, to unite and end the division among Palestinian political parties, and to go immediately to the United Nations in order to complete Palestine’s membership in all of its institutional bodies, particularly in the International Criminal Court, so that Israel may be held accountable for its crimes.

Barghouti said that it is no longer possible to be fooled by the actions of the Israeli government, as it continues to pursue its policy of ethnic cleansing against the Palestinian people. On 24 December, Israel demolished Palestinian Bedouin homes in the Jordan Valley as well as in a village near Ramallah, displacing a total of 68 people. Israeli forcers also recently handed out demolition orders in the village of Beit Ummar near Hebron. All of this, said Barhouti, comes alongside the steadily quickening pace of Israel’s settlement and Judiazation of Palestinian land.